


When the Undead Came

by Fire_Sign



Category: Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries
Genre: F/M, Gen, MFMM Flashfic Challenge, Zombie AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-25
Updated: 2020-01-25
Packaged: 2021-02-27 04:48:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22401307
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fire_Sign/pseuds/Fire_Sign
Summary: It is 1917 when Lance Corporal Jack Robinson comes across the remnants of a battle that is stricken from all official records, on both sides. He never speaks of what he saw on that scouting mission, but in the years that follow the images are the ones that haunt his dreams.A zombie story for the MFMM Flashfic Challenge prompt "Post-Apocalyptic"
Relationships: Phryne Fisher/Jack Robinson (implied)
Comments: 24
Kudos: 41
Collections: Miss Fisher's Flashfic Challenge Heat 1





	When the Undead Came

**Author's Note:**

> That's right, guys! The MFMM Flashfic challenge is back, and there's three heats left. Head over to [their Tumblr](https://mfmmflashchallenge.tumblr.com/) for all the details.

It is 1917 when Lance Corporal Jack Robinson comes across the remnants of a battle that is stricken from all official records, on both sides. He never speaks of what he saw on that scouting mission, but in the years that follow, the images are the ones that haunt his dreams.

Absolute carnage.

Some of them were still alive.

They weren’t for long.

***

It is 1924 when Phryne Fisher, globe-trotting adventuress, hears rumours of a wartime horror that is beyond comprehension, in a war that was full of incomprehensible horrors. It is a fellow Australian, far from home, that tells her, the guilt clearly eating him up inside; the moments they share in that night are more intimate than any sex, and he is gone by morning, leaving behind a letter telling her to forget what he’d said.

She does, mostly.

***

It is 1929 when Elizabeth MacMillan, only recently made coroner, is performing an autopsy on a veteran who had taken his own life. The rope had burnt his neck as he struggled, clawing at his own throat, desperate to live. She has just cracked open his chest to examine the heart, not beating, when he moves, a small jerk of his limbs. It’s unsettling but not unheard of, so she continues.

Then he lunges.

It is a credit to her calm professionalism that she reacts as she does, jumping away and quickly putting a locked door between herself and the man, once living, who is trying to attack her.

This is not how she expected to start her Thursday.

***

It is a great surprise for Phryne when she arrives at the morgue for confirmation of a suicide, merely a formality before moving on to the case that is her actual focus, and finding a slightly disheveled Mac in the corridor as chaos reigns inside—crashes, howls, a body slamming against the door.

“Unexpected guest, Doctor?” Jack asks from beside her, as they both shift into a defensive stance, Phryne pulling her pistol from her handbag.

The look Mac shoots them is unsettling.

“Our victim,” she says. “Who I would say has had a miraculous recovery, but is most definitely dead.”

It’s an utterly absurd assertion, but she trusts Mac’s judgment.

The door rattles again, then a shuffling noise. The sound of the window shattering reaches them, and they exchange a quick look—there’s nothing for it, and they open the door, hoping the man will not escape.

He’s still inside, shards of glass embedded in his arm. There’s no blood, and when he turns to face them Phryne can see his open chest. She has seen men alive in horrific conditions; he most definitely is not.

He lunges. She shoots.

In the aftermath, they stand in the morgue, waiting for him to move once more, trying to understand what they’ve just seen.

***

Hugh is one of the first to die, before the world has even begun to grasp what is happening. The authorities have not yet been notified of the man in the morgue, because who, precisely, is in charge of that? So it is with no warning that he’s called out to a domestic disturbance, nothing a constable hasn’t done a dozen times before.

He is not prepared for what he finds when he pushes open the door to that unsuspecting little flat.

He fights back, wishing he’d brought a gun; he manages to grab a fireplace poker and hit the attacker (he struggles to think of him as a man, his features so twisted, gaping jaw and empty sockets where his eyes once were, flesh falling from his body), a solid strike to the head rendering him inanimate. It is too late for Hugh though; there is a bite on his arm that burns, blackens.

His last thought is of Dottie.

***

Bert and Cec are halfway to Sydney, Jane in the back seat, when they see a figure shambling along the highway.

“Oh, Bert!” Jane cries out. “Shouldn’t we—”

“I ain’t stopping,” Bert says, scowling. “Not with you, Jane.”

***

Dot is at church, knitting booties while she waits for a funeral to start. She’s known the deceased since she was a wee girl; he’d used to sneak her sweets, before the war, and was never quite the same when he came back. There’s a thump and a rattle of the coffin and she jumps, quickly realises that the dead man must not be truly dead; a sign from God, perhaps. Before she can think further, the wood _splinters_ and he lurches out, runs towards Dot with a grimace on his face that—

Her knitting needle goes through his eye, and she sends a quick prayer to her heavenly father for forgiveness.

***

Wardlow is many things, but not a good defense against the determined undead, as Mr Butler learns as he prepares chicken fricassée. His arsenal, on the other hand, is. He has successfully held them off when Miss Fisher, Doctor MacMillan, and the inspector arrive. Dot arrives an hour later, panting and sweating.

They wait three days for Hugh before realising they need to get out of the city.

***

(“I need to go to the station, Phryne. Without—”

“Absolutely not, Jack. We all heard the news on the wireless. All we can do now is survive.”

It is not her words that keep him there, but the fact that not even _Phryne Fisher_ is willing to take on this battle and win.)

***

They hear from the cabbies before communications go down entirely, get directions to the modest farmhouse they have holed up in with Jane. They can make it, Wardlow stripped of every useful resource for this new world and loaded into the Hispano. The night before they leave, Phryne hesitates, peering out her boudoir window to take one last look at the city she has called home. Jack slides beside her, slips his hand into hers.

“We can’t save them all,” he says. “All we can do now is survive.”

They drive away when morning dawns, all beautiful pinks and blues.

***

Dot’s daughter is born a few months after the end of the world. She names the girl Judith, tells her of her father, teaches her how to shoot. Judy never knows what the world was like before, but she knows what it is like to be loved by the ragtag family that have helped each other survive, long before the undead came.

**Author's Note:**

> Judith's name is a nod to the face that Saint Jude is the patron saint of hopeless causes, without the exceedingly on the nose metaphor of naming the kid Jude. I was quite pleased, and then had a vague recollection that the kid in The Walking Dead gets called Judith. Too late to change it now. (I'd also considered Hope, but Dot's way too Catholic not to use a saint's name. Whatevs.)


End file.
